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Jay Jaffe FanGraphs Chat - 10/1/21
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AvatarJay Jaffe
2:48
while I'd be tempted to go with Corbin Burnes on the basis of his microscopic FIP, Zack Wheeler's 52-inning advantage and the two-win gap between the two of them that comes up when one incorporates adjustments for quality of defense and opponent via bWAR carries the day for me there
the late-season hiccups of Scherzer and Buehler simplified that race for me
Nate
2:49
As a Yankees fan, it continues to blow my mind that the Red Sox traded Mookie Betts. They don’t get enough criticism for that IMO.
AvatarJay Jaffe
2:49
I do my best to remind the world of that fact
Bobbo the Blobbo
2:49
I have absolutely fallen in love with ole Cedric this year. Is he going to be this dynamic in future years, or is this Brady Anderson hitting 50 homers devil magic?
AvatarJay Jaffe
2:51
On the basis of just one season at this level I wouldn't bank on 30 homers again given his xSLG, barrel, and hard-hit rates, but he is hitting the ball in the air and harder than before. I do hope he can be somewhere near as entertaining as he was this year
Mitchell
2:52
Unless some one among Soto, et al goes bonkers with the bat this closing weekend, 2021 will mark the first, full regular season in which no position player amassed as much as 7 WAR since 1918, when Cobb led baseball with 6.5. What might one make of that?
AvatarJay Jaffe
2:54
If you're going just by our numbers, there are three players (Vladito and Semien being the others) at 6.6 with three games to go so I wouldn't write off the possibility. Beyond that, I think we've seen fallout from last year's shortened season in a higher injury rate and efforts to counteract that with workload management. If we see two years in a row like this, maybe it's actually something rather than just an artifact of the outage
Nate
2:54
What historical player do you most wish could be measured by stat cast? Mantle?
AvatarJay Jaffe
2:55
whew, it's impossible to pick just one. Ruth, Gehrig, Mantle, Mays, Walter Johnson, Bob Feller, Nolan Ryan... the mind reels
david
2:55
any chance extended september rosters return? it probably was't great for quality of games but i enjoyed seeing guys get a chance in the bigs who otherwise might not.
AvatarJay Jaffe
2:56
Maybe another player or two added but probably not going back towards 40
Farhandrew Zaidman
2:56
Who do you have producing more WAR the rest of their respective careers: Corey Seager or Trea Turner?
AvatarJay Jaffe
2:59
I'll go with Seager but I think both are going to have long and productive careers. The two players have produced about the same amount of WAR in their careers, with Turner getting about 400 more PA and being about a year older. Yes, Seager's missed time due to injuries, but a broken bone isn't predictive of future problems the way a soft tissue injury is.
Cynthia
3:00
Is Jackie Bradley Jr. cooked on offense? He was never a world-beater offensively, but this year he's been historically bad and will be 32 next year. Do you think the Brewers release him before his contract ends?
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:02
Having championed his signing last spring, I'll take the L on that one because a 36 wRC+ that's not tied to an injury-related explanation (see Cody Bellinger) is unfathomable. He's always been pretty volatile offensively, and I wonder how much the late signing meant to his offensive woes.
Jake in Pittsburgh
3:03
So I see on the homepage that the Phillies are looking for analysts and programmers (plural). Huh...you laugh out of town the young, dynamic, analytically-minded manager who goes on to lead a team, out of nowhere, to the best record in baseball. And now you want to invest more in this analytics thing. Go figure.
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:06
To be fair, Kapler had work to do as a manager as well, and it helped that he landed in a front office led by a man (Zaidi) who had already been part of two successful, analytically-driven front offices in Oakland and Los Angeles. I would have thought Joe Girardi would have fared better in Philadelphia based on his success in New York, but that decidedly hasn't been the case
Alaska Tracy
3:06
Would have liked to asked Fred C. Harris this, but do you have an opinion on Fanatics trying to monopolize the fan side of the game by acquiring baseball card rights and now trying to get a gambling license?
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:07
We didn't touch on the gambling aspect but I did talk to Harris a bit about the Fanatics stuff later in the podcast.
5 Run Homer
3:07
I find it very funny that both Cole and Ray had their Cy Young bids damaged by each other's teams on back-to-back nights
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:07
Crazy, right? I wonder how many voters mailed their ballots in already.
OutsideAnimals
3:08
Do teams in preparation for a huge FA offer or trade ever have interns/analysts go through video of every at bat or fielding opportunity to gauge luck or weird outcomes against the statistics? If I was going to shell out $200 mil, I'd want to double check everything with video.
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:13
This would be a better question for Kevin given his front office experience but on the offensive side, I highly doubt it gets that granular, particularly when we have Statcast xBA, xSLG, and various versions of xBABIP floating around, not to mention multipe fielding metrics including in-house proprietary ones
Cynthia
3:13
What % of players do you think could name a sub-Saharan African country (excluding South Africa) and point it out on a map?
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:14
Why should we care? I'd love for a greater percentage of players to know geography but there are significant barriers to that happening, and none of it changes the quality of the baseball we get
Mi Nombre
3:14
Jeter & Larkin had incredibly similar careers from a value standpoint. Do you give the edge to Derek for longevity & postseason success or to Barry for being a better defender & accumulating similar value over considerably less (like 550 G / 3,500 PAs) playing time?
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:17
It depends what you're after. They produced similar value despite Jeter getting about 3,500 more PA thank Larkin. Larkin produced 5.2 bWAR per 162 games, Jeter 4.2. The higher value increases your chances of winning a championship in a given year, but the longer career keeps the window open for a greater amount of time, and if you've got a stronger team around him (which was the case for the Yankees vs. the Reds) you're going to win more by that route
Ben Cherington
3:18
If you're still short on questions I'd love to hear your thoughts on Roansy Contreras's MLB debut.
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:18
Alas, the Pirates aren't on my viewing agenda these days and I'm not a prospect guy. I'm 100% certain Joe Girardi would call him "Roansie," if that helps.
Zach
3:19
If Corey Seager leads the Dodgers to another World Series can Friedman and Co. really justify not giving him whatever he wants?
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:19
I have a tough time watching Seager and thinking the Dodgers can afford to let him get away. Pay the man
Mr. Redlegs
3:20
Is Eugenio's 30 homer season the least valuable of all time? How do we get him back on track for next year?
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:22
30 homers with 0.1 WAR is pretty bad, but Dave Kingman hit 37 and was 0.5 BELOW replacement level in 1982 and also 36 with -0.8 WAR in 1986, plus he was a misogynistic asshole who didn't get another deal after that year because he sent a rat to a female reporter.
Naftali
3:22
Where do you think Correa goes?
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:22
Detroit makes a certain amount of sense given where they are competitively and the amount of noise being made.
Nate
3:23
How about Cool Papa Bell for stat cast?
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:23
Oh man, dozens of Negro Leagues players as well. Satchel Paige, Josh Gibson, Bell, Rogan...
Thunderclap Jackson
3:24
Where would you rank Morton, Fried, Anderson among NL playoff rotations? Morton and Fried have been cookin lately, and Anderson has seemed solid after some early post-injury worries
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:24
in order, off the top of my head: LA, Milwaukee, Atlanta, SF, STL
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